The Bioethics of Botany
by StarlitWave10
Summary: Utopia is a brand new planet in the Musain solar system, and one botanist's dream comes true when she goes to study the brand new life forms that have evolved there. But will the plant be all that she discovers? And is there some connection to the murders she's been hearing about from a golden-haired stranger?


**Okay so I'm not sure if this'll go anywhere. I'm not even sure if I'll have the next chapter out before next year, although I'll certainly try. I haven't written anything as long as I'm planning to make this story for a while, so please bear with me! **

**Enjoy!**

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><p>"Marius, this is no different from when you decided to go on a random trip back to Old Earth."<p>

_"__Eponine, you're going to a brand new planet, of course I'm worried-"_

Eponine could practically see her boyfriend, sitting in the comfiest chair in their apartment, drinking coffee and staring aimlessly at his laptop. "It's only for a few months. And I'll be sure to call you every day, as often as I can." She signaled to the waitress for a drink – Blue Jasmine Tea, the newest rage and best-tasting drink since chocolate-vodka coffee. "Marius, this kind of opportunity comes around once in a lifetime. Besides, I've got Combeferre by my side." Her eyes drifted over to the sleeping doctor on her left, glasses slightly askew.

_"__Combeferre's not exactly prepped for battle-"_

"He opened that jar of pickles you'd been worrying at for a week."

_"__I'd loosened it for him!" _

Eponine laughed, truly laughed since she'd gotten on the plane bound for Utopia: a brand new planet, lush with green fields and new organisms.

Any botanist's dream.

"Marius, my love," Eponine continued, "it'll be fine. We don't plan on harassing anyone, and if they do, well…I knew that background in karate would come in hand someday."

Marius groaned on the other line.

"Excuse me, Miss?" Eponine looked up to see a dark-skinned stewardess, pristinely dressed in the blue uniforms of the interstellar, airline workers.

"Phones off, Miss, we'll be landing shortly."

Eponine nodded her assent and the stewardess left, going on to deal with the screaming child in Row 17, Seat D once more.

"Marius, we'll be landing soon, so I've got to go, but I'll call you as soon as I can, alright?"

Marius grumbled out a response, causing Eponine to smile despite the butterflies floating in her belly.

"Love you!" She said, turning off her phone and jabbing Combeferre harshly beneath his ribs. Her jerked awake, glasses tumbling off his ears and landing sideways on his chest.

"Eponine?" He mumbled through a yawn. "We there yet?"

"Open your window," she replied, and held her breath as he pulled up the shade.

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><p>"Grantaire, I really don't think you should be drinking right now."<p>

"What better time would there be, my golden Apollo?" Grantaire snickered, drops of the liquid tumbling out of his bottle. Enjolras scowled at the nickname, and turned his eyes back towards the sky.

"The records showed that the lovely botanist lady is on that plane." Grantaire raised the bottle as if in salute to her. "What better reason would there be for drinking? She helps you solve the case, and we get welcomed back as Heroes of Earth."

His eyes glimmered with cynicism.

"You can take the label, they never did me much good," Enjolras replied without tearing his eyes away from the spaceship.

"Oi, Enj – is that her?" Courfeyrac sauntered up to the duo, with something glinting in his eyes.

"Grantaire gets the label, you get the credit, and I get the girl," he snickered.

"We need her analysis of the plant, nothing more," Enjolras declares, in a tone that presented no room for argument. Nevertheless, Courfeyrac tried.

"But she's so far from home, no doubt she'll need-"

"Our notes on the plant that we've uncovered." Enjolras finished and walked back to their camp. Courfeyrac shook his head while Grantaire gazed on, bemused.

"Such a shame, I'm sure she's beautiful," Courfeyrac said, eyes trailing towards the spaceship's landing.

"Yeah, I'm sure she is," Grantaire replied softly, eyes never leaving Enjolras' retreating back.

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><p>The planet was everything she'd dreamed it would be, and more. Through the tiny airplane window, Eponine could see the wings of the spaceship begin to open and unfurl in preparation for an airplane-style landing. No matter how she twisted her head, all she could see was green for miles and miles.<p>

"It's beautiful," she whispered, practically lying on top of Combeferre in her excitement.

"Ep – elbow – ribs," he grunted, laughing breathlessly when she finally moved back into her own seat.

"Just think," she began while buckling her seat belt, fingers fluttering around her waist. "Soon, we'll be on a new planet, with all of these marvelous scientists! I heard Montparnasse was going to be here, even, and he's a genius! I've read all of his work, and if he's here-"

Eponine broke off when she heard a snap. In her excitement, she'd begun worrying the metal clasp of her seat belt. When she looked down, the clasp was in two pieces, lying daintily in her lap. She sent Combeferre a sheepish smile and put her hands in her lap to block the pieces from the stewardess' view.

"Oops," she chuckled. Combeferre smiled in return before fixing his glasses and closing his eyes.

"I'm excited, too, Ep," he mumbled. She leaned back in her seat and tried to calm her beating heart. It was all so real, it was actually happening, this dream that she'd had for so long.

She just couldn't believe it. She clenched her fists as the spaceship began to descend, and forced herself to close her eyes and breathe in deeply as the sun from the Musain solar system streamed in through the windows and warmed her hands.

* * *

><p>Marius continued to stare at his phone even after he'd hung up. Eponine had always been one to go off on adventures, but never for so long as six months. He looked around his newly empty apartment, filled with various flowers and plants. His own area was cordoned off with certain case files that he occasionally brought home, but he'd always preferred the calming scents from Eponine's flowers to his plain manila folders.<p>

And now she was gone, and she'd asked him, the half of them who was never home, to water her plants until she came back.

Perfect.

Marius sighed and stood up, stretching as he did so. Their apartment was always filled with light, both natural and synthetic, but a walk around the city had always done more good than harm. He left his phone on his desk and grabbed a light jacket, hoping to stroll through the port and take in the sharp, salty air.

His mind still held the image of screaming gulls when he crashed into something on his way out into the hallway.

No, not something. Some_one._

The girl was lovely, like a summer day come blissfully early. She had her golden hair tied in a braid which hung over one shoulder, and her skin was as pale as Eponine's was tan. Her eyes were cornflower blue, the same shade as her dress.

"Excuse me," he muttered, suddenly realizing that he was staring and tore his eyes away from her and onto the nearby wall. But they betrayed him and glanced back to see her smiling.

"No, it was my fault. I had my nose stuck in this." She held up a copy of Victor Hugo's _Les Miserables. _Eponine had never been one for books, claiming that you could always find them online, that printed copies were merely destroying the trees.

But Marius had always liked the smell of a new book.

"I wasn't much better. I certainly wasn't looking where I was going." He stumbled over his words like they were ice and he'd forgotten his skates at home. The girl raised an eyebrow, and held out her hand.

"Agree to disagree? I'm Cosette, by the way."

Marius smiled and shook her hand in return, figuring that this walk might turn out to be more pleasant than he'd expected.

"Marius."


End file.
